Word: huk
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...better to fight Communist-led Huk rebels, President Quirino last October ordered a nationwide suspension of the writ of habeas corpus.* After three months, it looked as if the suspension was being used less to ferret out Communists than to intimidate Quirino critics...
Ever since he became President in 1948, pudgy little Elpidio Quirino has regularly announced that his government forces have routed the Philippines' Communist-led Huk guerrillas. Two weeks ago, the Huks went on the rampage again, attacked 15 villages, killed some 100 Filipino soldiers and civilians. Quirino decided it was time to tell the people the truth. He went on the radio, admitted his soldiers had failed to stem the Huk tide, called on his people to form a "citizens' army...
...little fact about Asia came home to me on this Huk trip only after several days of puzzled awareness that something was missing. Even in battalion commanders' quarters there were no bathroom mirrors, no place to shave. I realized very late in the game that my pleasant hosts almost never have to shave...
Lately this situation has improved a little, as the Philippine army ground forces have gradually taken over the campaign from the mistrusted, abusive Philippine constabulary. If this trend continues, the Huks will be finished, for they cannot live without the aid-voluntary or forced-of the people in the countryside. In this sense, the Huk war is a struggle for the confidence of thousands of peasants and rural workers who in their underpaid, underprivileged past have never been given much reason for confidence. Who is winning this struggle now? Maybe a certain Colonel Abay knows a little of the answer...
...Sometimes you know a Huk is that one"-jab-"that one"-jab-"or that one? How you know? You do not know"-here he waves at the window, opening on nearby rice fields. "Sometimes you see them. You fight them, maybe. But you do not know"-a huge shrug-"they go away...